Rogue Miller accuses own party of 'misconduct' over council

Hayden started in 2013 as a cadet journalist on the Fraser Coast Chronicle before relocating to Fairfax Media in Tasmania three years later. Hayden joined the Queensland Times in November 2017 as a political journalist with a focus on Ipswich City Council. He has covered two state and one federal budget.

JO-ANN Miller has accused her own State Government of "misconduct or maladministration or worse" in its lack of action in dealing with complaints about the Ipswich City Council.

Ms Miller repeated her claims that the Labor leadership, Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk and her deputy Jackie Trad, knew about "hundreds" of corruption complaints.

"The Premier was told by me that I believed that the former mayor of Ipswich was allegedly corrupt," Ms Miller said.

"The Deputy Premier and then minister for local government also knew due to her role as minister for local government and her previous role as a member of the PCCC.

"I want to know, given these revelations and the obvious lack of action, whether this amounts to official misconduct or maladministration or worse, given that very little appears to have been done, even though there is a duty to get on with the job and look at these matters and also a duty to notify the CCC of alleged corrupt conduct.

"I believe such behaviour constitutes continuous reckless decision-making, reckless judgement and perhaps even reckless political favouritism, bearing in mind that many of the councillors in Ipswich were elected one way or another as Labor councillors or perceived to be elected in that way."

It is not the first time Ms Miller has fired shots at her own party.

Last year she drew comparisons between the Palaszczuk Government and the corrupt Bjelke-Petersen era - a claim Ms Palaszczuk has continually rejected.

Ms Miller's outburst in the Parliament came during a debate about amendments to the Local Government Act and the proposed banning of developer donations.

She said the situation in Ipswich had put pressure on council staff and claimed a life.

"We have had one officer of local government in the Ipswich City Council suicide," she said.

"Many have been hospitalised due to stress, anxiety and depression. Many have resigned over the years in disgust. Many have been sacked.

"Many others have been paid out and forced to sign confidentiality agreements and pressured into not going to the CCC - not if they wanted to keep on living in Ipswich, that is."

Ms Miller said it was "time to close the door on this bad behaviour and wicked culture".

"It is time that residents stood up to the bullying and intimidating behaviour-like in Ipswich where, if you wrote a letter to the editor and it was printed in the Queensland Times, the mayor or councillors would knock on your front door early in the morning or they would ring you and abuse you," she said.

The rogue Member for Bundamba said an investigation should also be lodged into the state's peak body for councils.

"I ask in conclusion that there also be an investigation into the Local Government Association in Queensland, because it has morphed from a union of mayors and councillors, which I have no problem with at all, into a big corporate conglomerate and something needs to be done about them too," she said.